Abandoned
by artchaser
Summary: AU where Barry isn't taken in by the Wests and is instead placed in a foster home like Hunter Zolomon, where he is tormented by other children, is accused of lying about the man in the yellow suit, and eventually gets his powers. How different will his story be? Inspired by 2x18 ("I'd never become like you."). Please review!
1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note: So I'm planning for this to be a ten-chapter story... depends on if I get any new ideas(always welcome in the reviews!) and feedback from you guys. Please review if you enjoyed it so far. :)  
**

* * *

The Allen house was silent the night it happened. Barry can remember that much clearly. He was eleven years old. In bed, pretending to be asleep, watching the light from occasionally passing cars reflecting off his ceiling. He remembers how his room looked.

He remember the silence was broken by a piercing scream. A woman's scream. And that's where he could no longer tell what was real and what wasn't.

The water in the fish tank seemed to rise _up_ , out of the tank, and he remembers staring in shock. Then, remembering the scream, he ran out of the room, down the stairs, and even from the top of the stairs, he could see the red and yellow light, flashing with unbelievable speed, and he could hear clearly now the woman's screams, and, louder than that, the sound of a tornado _wooshing_ and spitting and thundering.

He had never gone down the stairs faster than he did that night, sprinting down all fourteen, almost tripping over his own feet and standing frozen in terror when he reached the bottom. Because the woman who had been screaming was in the center of the roaring tornado was his mother and it looked like a bolt of lightning was trapped in his living room.

Red and yellow streaks of electricity zoomed around the room so fast the entire house was shaking. Or maybe it was just Barry shaking, or maybe he was hallucinating the entire thing. " _Mom!_ " he screamed above the roaring. " _Mom!_ "

" _Barry!_ " Then " _Don't let him touch you!"_

He was trying to reach her, to see her behind the spinning wheel of light. But all he could see was the blinding lightning showering the dark room with the dizzying, racing colors that were so bright they seared into his eyelids so that he could see them when he blinked. He was desperately trying to compute what was happening, to understand what the light was and why his mom couldn't get out and who the person he shouldn't let touch him was when he saw it.

Just for a split second. Like the brief glimpse of lightning you can see right before it vanishes.

 _A man._

And just like that, Barry was certain the man in the yellow was the one trapping his mother, the one making the yellow and red light. He wasn't sure how, but he screamed above the storm again anyway.

" _Mom!"_

Then his dad, who he hadn't even realized was standing there, turned to him and gripped his shoulders with strong hands and cried above the wind, " _Run, Barry!"_ He shook Barry's shoulders. " _Run!"_ But Barry couldn't move, his legs were caked in wet cement and he was too entranced, too held captive by the howling lightning, and by the sight of his mother in the middle of a swirling whirlpool of light.

But before Barry could answer, he was no longer beside the tornado, and everything was dark and silent. He was in the middle of a deserted road he remembered- it was a street where he and Iris had ridden their bikes just a week before. But there was no way he could have gotten there on his own, no way at all, he had been by the lightning- the red and yellow were still imprinted on his vision, blocking his sight, and his ears were still ringing from the noise. He turned in a circle, his heart rate climbing despite the peace and silence of the street because he shouldn't _be_ there there was no way he should be there he needed to get back to his house, and just like that, Barry remembered his mom again, sitting in the center of the lightning, and he ran. He ran as fast as he could in the direction of his house, he knew the direction well enough to get there on his own, his feet slapping against the wet asphalt and splashing drops of rainwater behind him. His lungs burned the full mile back to his house, and he felt like he could barely breathe, but there were no cars and no one was going to help him and _he had to get back to the house_.

But when the house came into view, Barry could see more lights flashing- red and blue. The sound of approaching ambulances and sirens shrieked in the distance, but there were already _so many cars_ outside of his house, all flashing blue and red. He felt reassured for a few seconds- the police were here, they were going to take away the bad man and the lightning, they were going to help his mother, and the light was gone from the house so there was nothing left to be afraid of. He didn't stop running, though- he sprinted all the way up the sidewalk, before he came to a sudden stop.

The police were taking his father out of the house in handcuffs.

Barry's eyes grew wide. When they wouldn't let him talk to his dad, when they put him into the police car, Barry ducked under a police officer trying to stop him and into the house.

Detective West was there. He was Iris's dad, and he was talking to another officer about the big bag on the floor, and before anyone else could stop him Barry ran up and lifted up the bag, because there was something bad underneath it he just knew there was and-

The blank, staring face of his mother was underneath the bag.

Barry's heart felt like it had been shattered with a sledgehammer. Nausea curdled his insides as he shook his mother's shoulder and said in a disbelieving monotone, "Mom. _Mom_." He felt the panic rising and expanding in his stomach like a balloon, as his breathing came faster and faster and tears started to pool in his eyes because he couldn't seem to get enough air in and he didn't know what was going on and he had never been so _scared_.

A large hand gently rested on his shoulder, and Barry whirled around to see the sorrowful face of Detective West, whose stony features had never looked so defeated. "Hey, Barry," he said softly. "I'm going to need you to go with this lady over here for a minute, okay?" He crouched down so that he was eye-level with Barry. "She's going to take care of you, okay? She's going to make sure you're absolutely safe. She may need to ask you some questions, but nothing until you're ready, I promise. Do you see her?"

Barry didn't respond. He stared at Detective West with terror-filled eyes, still breathing shallowly and shaking. Detective West took Barry's hand. "Here, let's go see her together, okay? See, she's right here." They walked across the hall to a tall woman with frizzy, unruly hair who looked to be in her mid-forties. The woman looked down at the eleven year old, pity written across her face. Barry barely noticed her through his blurry, tear-filled vision, but finally comprehended what Detective West was saying and shook his small head vigorously. "No. _No!_ Detective West, please, don't leave me, please, I need to stay here, I need to find my dad and I don't know where he is and I need to help my mom and _please_ -" Barry broke off with a broken sob, hyperventilating as the impact of what was happening struck him with terror.

Detective West's own eyes filled with tears as he hugged Barry gently. "Barry, hey, shh. Everything is going to be fine, I _promise_ , but you need to go with Ms. Amelia right now, she's going to take care of you. I promise. I promise. Can you be brave for me now, Barry?"

Barry hesitated, looking up at Detective West's face. He had never wanted to say no more in his life, but Detective West was an adult, and Iris's dad, and he knew Barry's dad and he knew what to do.

Barry gave a small nod.

Ms. Amelia drove Barry far away from the police sirens, and the lights, and from Detective West and his mom. They drove all the way to downtown Central City, then into a small, wet, deserted parking lot filled with autumn leaves. By that time, Barry was quiet, tears still drying on his cheeks as he pressed his forehead to the cold window of the car and focused on breathing as deeply as he could. The air was still and silent when Barry finally opened the car door. The woman with the frizzy hair walked him all the way up the slippery brick stairs, into a little alcove with a door set inside that she unlocked with a jangling of keys. Barry had just enough time to read the sign above the door, which was hard to make out in the darkness, before he was escorted inside.

 _Western Central City Foster Home._


	2. Chapter 2

**Author's Note: Thank you all so, so much for your support for Chapter 1!** **I was able to find the inspiration for chapter 2 pretty quickly because of you guys, so again, thank you so much. Hope you enjoy the chapter. :)**

* * *

Three months after his arrival at the foster home, Barry was more miserable than he had ever remembered being in his life.

The first night he had spent in his new dormitory hall, which he shared with the rest of the boys at WCC, he had been so exhausted from the night's ordeal, and his eyes were so tired and swollen from tears, he had practically fallen asleep before his head was on his pillow. Despite the fact that the mattresses were tough and the room was too hot, he had never had a more restful night of sleep. He wished he could say the same about every night after that.

He was allowed to sleep late the morning after, only being woken up to eat breakfast and then dinner, both in bed. No one else bothered him. The children going about their business around them, barely pausing to stare, made him think that this was a regular occurrence for new children. He lay in bed the entire day, staring at the bunk above him, trying to process what had happened less than twenty four hours before.

His mother was dead.

He was certain of that. He had seen her, and the fact that they hadn't even tried to put her in the ambulance was the evidence he needed.

The disbelief had worn off, as had the heart-shattering, mind-numbing pain that had held him in its grip for the first half of the day, forcing him into a tight, shaking ball under the blanket on his bunk. There was a deep, deep sadness, a dull ache, now, but he was able to tuck it away for the first time to try and piece together the event of the previous night.

Where was his father? The police had put him in the car, in handcuffs. He hadn't done anything wrong, so maybe it was just a precaution. Barry wouldn't know what happened to him until the next morning, when, Ms. Amelia told him, some officers from the station would ask him some questions about what happened. He tried not a worry as he eventually fell asleep.

That night, he dreamed of the man in the yellow suit.

The next morning, the officers arrived shortly after he woke up. The pair, a man and a woman, were polite but reserved, and they asked him to sit across from them and tell them _exactly_ what happened.

And Barry did.

He recited everything he had seen, every detail- even insignificant things, like what they had eaten for dinner, or that it was a little warm inside the house- in a flat monotone. As he continued to talk, the expressions on the officers' faces gradually grew more and more stony, until they were staring at him in irritated disbelief.

About twenty minutes into the conversation ( _interrogation_ , Barry thought), he finished his story. The woman, who had stopped jotting down notes after the first ten minutes, looked more than a little annoyed.

"Mr...Allen," she said, finding the name on her sheet, "Your story is more than a little hard to believe."

Barry nodded vigorously. "I know. But it's the truth! I saw it. I don't know who the man with the yellow costume was, but he was the one who did it. He made the lightning storm, and he..." Barry trailed off.

The officer shook her head. "I'm very sorry. I know what happened last night was traumatizing for you, and I couldn't be more sorry for the loss of your mother." Barry's lips quivered.

"But I'm afraid we can't accept this story. It's just not...well..."

"Plausible?" The male officer offered.

"Exactly. We need something credible and substantial to take back with us to the police department."

Barry's eyebrows knit together. "You don't believe me?"

The woman plastered a fake smile on and patted his hand. "I believe that you are the witness to a very traumatic event that may have altered your reasoning a bit. None of it's your fault, of course. But we need a report, and unless we have some evidence to back your story up..."

"I swear I'm telling the truth!" Barry said frustratedly. "I saw it. All of it! I would bet my life on it!" The officer did not appear convinced. "Ask my dad, if you don't believe me! You talked with him too, right? I bet he told you the exact same thing I did! We both were there! He saw the lightning too! He saw it!"

"Mr. Allen," the officer said slowly, "Your father pleaded guilty for the murder of Nora Allen last night, who died from a stab wound. Detective West and I escorted him to Iron Heights early this morning."

Barry froze. That wasn't possible. His dad had seen the lightning. He had seen it. He had told him to run, away from the man, just like his mom so why would he not tell the truth? His dad said to always tell the truth, and there was no way he hadn't told them about the lightning.

"No," he breathed.

The female officer patted his hand again. It felt awkward. Cold. Fake. "Again, Mr. Allen. I'm very sorry for your loss. However, we need to report back to the station now. If you remember anything else... anything you might be trying to not think about right now, but you might think of later... just let us know, okay?"

Barry was left alone in the sweltering dormitory of the foster home. He sat on his bunk, staring at his feet. Trying to make sense of what was real and what wasn't.

He had been so sure about seeing the lightning. It seemed so real, and the image of it seemed burned into his memory. The man, too. He needed to believe it was real. Because _how else was he teleported over ten blocks away_?

Unless none of it was real. Unless he had seen something terrible, and his brain was making all of the lightning up. But no, no, he was _sure._ The water floating out of the fish tank. The red and yellow electricity. The roaring of the wind in his very living room. It was too real not to be true.

So why was he doubting himself?

Barry wished more than anything he could go talk to his dad. To reassure himself that what had happened was real and to feel the warmth and safety of his embrace, like he had every day until today. But he couldn't. Because he was in prison, and there was no way-

Barry jolted upright. _Detective West._ The officer had said that Detective West had been the one to take his dad away. _How could he do that?_ He put his dad in prison. Even though he didn't do anything. He told Barry everything would be fine, and then he left to go take his dad to jail.

He had taken his dad away and now he was going to live here, in a _foster home_ , with no dad, no family at all. It was Detective West's fault. It was him. It was all him. He had _lied_ to Barry about keeping him safe and that everything was going to be fine because everything was _not_ fine and he had _lied_.

All of the confusion and frustration and pain Barry had felt in the past twenty-four hours suddenly gave way to a roaring torrent of _hate_. Detective West had taken his dad- Detective West's own _friend_ \- to prison for no reason, and he had _abandoned Barry._

He had abandoned Barry and taken his father away from him.

* * *

That revelation had been three months ago.

Sometimes, the only thing that kept Barry on his feet through all the harassment, the contemptuous, unfeeling administrators, the cruel children who were determined to hurt him, was that hate. That cold, heavy ball of black obsidian that sat in his stomach, obsidian made from molten, spitting fire that had cooled and hardened over time until it was impenetrable, gave him strength.

Barry had long since stopped trying to answer questions in class, or correct a teacher's mistake because of the snickers and verbal abuse he received after. He had stopped scoring higher than other children on quizzes because of the yellow and black bruises he had no choice but to sport because he knew the teachers would do nothing. He rarely ate more than a portion of his food, and grew even smaller because of it.

The children at the foster home were mean and spiteful. Every one of them had suffered a tragedy, and they all needed someone to blame, someone to take their anger, grief, and loneliness out on. Barry, as a quiet, gentle new kid, was a neon target.

The first time Barry had attempted to make a friend at the home, about a week after he arrived, he had made a harmless joke about the kid's colored hair a few minutes into their conversation, and the older teen broke his arm.

He had not been allowed to talk with his father since his imprisonment. The two officers that came to talk with him originally never appeared again.

Detective West never visited either.

Barry felt as if he had been uprooted from his pleasant old life and transplanted in the harsh reality of the world. The world where his mother could die and his father sent to prison and where everyone he knew could suddenly just abandon him in his time of need.

He never talked about his past, or that night in the lightning. The other kids had heard about it, obviously, through rumors, but nothing about the real story. Just that his mother had been murdered and that he was crazy because of it.

He wasn't crazy. He knew it. They all said he was, but he knew what was real and the man in the yellow was real, and Detective West's lies were real, and his father's innocence was real. It was all true. But there was nothing he could do about it.

At least, not yet.

* * *

 **Things will really be picking up in Chapter 3, heheh, so stay tuned. Please r &r if you enjoyed! **


	3. Chapter 3

**Author's Note: Again, I cannot thank you all enough for your support of this fic.**

 **Death By Verbicide: You are awesome, and thank you so much. Waiting for that next chapter of The Uncontrollable and The Impossible. ;)**

 **Guest: I'm not sure if I'm going to dive into the realm of SnowBarry (at least for now), but you never know. It's very possible, and thanks for the idea.**

 **Silver-Infinite: Oh, yes. Most definitely.**

 **And to all the other amazing people who reviewed and left such awesome comments: You are all just absolutely incredible. Thank you all so much. Hope you enjoy chapter 3!**

* * *

The fourth time Barry tried to run away to Iron Heights to see his father, he made it more than two steps into the building before he was blocked by a security guard, who recognized him immediately. With an irritated sigh, the burly man grabbed Barry by the forearm and led him into the front office of the prison.

Twenty seconds later, the foster home picked up the phone. "Hi, ma'am, this is officer Clarkson. Yes, he's here again. He's waiting by the office. Yes. Anytime."

Barry glared at the man as he placed the phone back on its handle. The officer sat down heavily in his chair and folded his arms across his chest. He scrutinized Barry for several seconds.

The kid looked no older than thirteen, with a small frame, dark hair, and hazel eyes. But there was a certain air to him- the set of his jaw, the tenseness of his position- that made him seem much older. And he couldn't help but be taken aback by the glittering animosity in the kid's eyes, which he was certain could only be meant for him. It was unsettling on his innocent, angelic face.

The officer didn't even feel comfortable being in the same _room_ with this kid. Which was ridiculous, considering he couldn't weigh more than a hundred pounds and barely topped five feet. He had stopped Allen's kid from entering the facility three previous times; apparently, Henry Allen had been imprisoned for the murder of his wife. Despite apparently _watching_ the murder happen, Allen's kid had never ceased attempting to break into the building to see his father.

They sat in charged silence for the full five minutes it took for the foster home to arrive. The kid continued to unnerve him. After the first minute and a half of staring, the officer had to look away and turn to his computer, because _Jesus,_ did the kid even blink? He couldn't help but to breath a sigh of relief when the home had arrived and he was alone again.

* * *

Barry was still fuming when they arrived back at the home. He had been _so_ close. He had made it past the security fences, all the way from school, without _anyone_ noticing. But of course, the guard just _had_ to recognize him.

He had made it his goal to eventually meet with his father, despite the rule that underage relatives could not visit or send letters to higher-security prisoners without a parent or guardian. Which he did not have.

Ms. Amelia had refused to take him when he had first asked two years ago(and the time after that, and the time after that). No amount of pleading seemed to convince her. She was resolute in her opinion that seeing Henry would be detrimental to Barry's wellbeing. After all, wasn't he a convicted murderer?

Barry knew that she was wrong. Everyone was. They all thought that his dad was his mother's killer, and that the threat had been successfully put away, but they were so very, very mistaken. The man in yellow was still out there, and yet no one was _doing_ anything about him. There was a murderer on the loose, and they had the wrong guy. And no one believed him when he tried to convince them.

So, yeah, he was _understandably_ bitter.

Barry navigated back to the boy's dormitory, angrily kicking the edges of the carpeted floors as he did so. His fists were clenched so hard his knuckles were paper-white. The other kids- mostly younger ones- turned around immediately when they saw him, and others kept as far away from him as possible as they came down the halls, their shoulders pressed against the peeling walls.

Barry didn't like being feared by the other children. He wasn't even fourteen yet- he was still younger than half the kids there. And yet all but a handful of them were too terrified of him to even look him in the eye.

He knew he'd become a lot harder and crueler, more rough around the edges, than he had been when he'd arrived at the foster home. He was no longer the happy-go-lucky kid he had originally been. Circumstance had forced him to change. He had to be tough and mean if he wanted to survive the foster home. But was that necessarily bad? He had been weaker then, not as independent and resourceful. People no longer saw him as a useless burden, or a cute toy; now, he was seen as a threat, a force to be reckoned with.

He had become a laser rather than a target; children were hurt because of him, now, not the other way around. He had changed positions in life, and as far as he was concerned, it wasn't necessarily a bad thing. Even if it did have a few unintended consequences.

The only other people in the dormitory were Tony, Mark, and Roy. Of course. Of all the people at WCC, they were the last people he would ever choose to be present, alone, with him in the dorm room. They were the three biggest bullies (and, coincidentally, idiots) at the foster home. They might have been less of a threat separately, but together, even Barry didn't dare to take them on.

Normally, Barry would have quietly skirted around the other rooms to enter the other side of the dorm and get to his bunk unnoticed. In his current mood, however?

Not a chance.

He walked straight through the dorm, between the rows of bunks, and shoved his way through their cluster, knocking Mark to the side as he did so.

Before he could reach his side of the dorm, there was a hand grabbing a handful of the shirt on his shoulder roughly, and Barry whipped around just in time to see Tony's fist. He had been expecting it, though, and managed to knock the blow aside with his forearm.

Tony grunted with annoyance. He knew Barry might be able to block his lopsided punch, but he had at least hoped to catch him by surprise. It had been a stupid move, but really, who the hell did Allen think he was, anyway? Strutting through the middle of their group like he was invincible.

He wasn't. Not by a long shot. Before Allen had been at the foster care for three or four months, he had been the class punching bag. Tony and his group had spent their fair share of time beating him up, in fact. But he had gradually grown faster and stronger and, as much as Tony hated to admit it, scarier.

There was an indescribable air to Allen; while he wasn't the type to attack or retaliate outright, he was cruel and calculated and so smart, it was scary. There was no explaining it. Some of the kids said he was crazy; Tony didn't buy it. But that uncertainty kept him and his group from pounding Allen into the floor every time he did something stupid... at least, physically. Not this time, though.

"Watch where you're going, _Lightning Boy,_ " Tony spat.

"I'm not in the mood, Tony." Barry said quietly.

Tony sneered. "What, did you get caught going to see your old murderer- I mean, man again?"

Behind him, Roy and Mark snorted with laughter.

Barry's eyes glinted dangerously, and Tony's grin faded slightly. Barry managed to contain himself and not throw a punch, though. Instead, he swiveled around on his heel and walked to his bunk, the boys snickering behind him. He knew they wouldn't dare come after him. They were a little scared of him, too.

* * *

The next day, Barry was in a better mood. That didn't stop the students- and even the teachers- from avoiding him in the halls, but it made a huge difference in the way he went about his day. He didn't injure any of the new kids, and he only _subtly_ bullied his teachers. He even studied a bit during lunch for a test in biology.

Not that anyone noticed, of course. And if anyone _had,_ and had the guts to point it out to him, he would have destroyed them, which would have ruined his excellent mood.

As Barry stacked his books and prepared to leave biology, the teacher, Mrs. Medea, called out, "Barry Allen? Please see me after class."

The other students' eyes widened as they murmured to each other. The classroom was filled with a flurry of whispers, all about the same thing- that the infamous Barry Allen had finally been caught red-handed.

"-You think he's gonna be kicked out?"

"-never been called after-"

"-Ha! Finally-"

Barry remained impassive as he placed his books back on his desk, crossed his arms, and slouched back in his chair, waiting for the last of the students to leave.

When they finally had, Mrs. Medea stood up from her desk and walked over to Barry's desk, then took a seat at a desk across from his. She looked almost comical in the child's desk, her knees almost touching the bottom of the table, but Barry managed to keep from making a snide comment.

Mrs. Medea cleared her throat. "Barry, have you, um, been in contact with your father recently?"

Barry's mood darkened immediately. So this was what this chat was about.

"Ah, no. You won't let me see him or send him letters or even let him know I exist. Remember?" he said sullenly.

Mrs. Medea cleared her throat again. "Oh, uh, yes. Well. I, uh, received some bad news this morning."

Barry became very still. "Yes?"

She drummed her fingers on the desk nervously. "Well, Mr. Allen was, uh, he- he passed away last night."

Barry felt his entire body freeze, as if he had been dipped in a pool of icy water. His fingers felt clammy as he clenched the metal bars connecting the desk to his chair.

"How?" he asked calmly, not looking up.

Mrs. Medea swallowed. "It was a, uh, a suicide. They're still-still investigating the scene-"

Barry nodded, struggling to swallow past the hard, painful lump in his throat. "Okay. Thank you." He stood up suddenly, forcing his fingers to release their tight grip on the desk and swiping his books into his arms.

"Barry, wait-" Mrs. Medea called after him, but he was already out the door and down the hall.

Barry walked quickly to the restroom closest to the biology room, unshed tears blurring his vision. Fortunately he encountered no one in the hallway on his way there. It was lunch time, after all.

As soon as he was in the room, Barry dropped his books and practically ran to the nearest stall, locking the door behind him.

And that was when he allowed himself to break down.

Hot tears dripped onto the tiled floor as he gasped for air, clenching the top of the stall door for support. His entire body was shaking uncontrollably, and that horrible, drowning sense of panic he hadn't felt in nearly two years again enveloped him. Sweat beaded on his forehead and his eyes squeezed shut so tightly he saw bursts of color because _no, no, this wasn't happening- this wasn't happening again._

His father was gone. His mother was gone.

Now he truly had no one left.

He was incapacitated by another racking, hiccuping sob. _He hadn't even gotten to say goodbye. Not even a word to or from him in over two years._

Barry stayed in his position, eyes and fists clenched shut, tears streaking down his face, for several minutes. Then he took a deep, shuddering breath and opened the stall door to get some water.

After fumbling with the tap and adjusting the torrent of freezing water, he cupped his hands and brought a splash up to his face. He froze when he looked in the mirror above the sink.

He looked _awful._ Red, puffy eyes and dark wet eyelashes. Nose running freely. His skin unnaturally pink. The front of his hairline soaked in sweat.

He looked weak. Pathetic. Disgusting.

How had a few words, a few strings of syllables brought him back down to _this_ so quickly? How had some simple news stripped away every defense he had built around himself in the past two years? Barry turned away from his reflection in disgust.

No. He would refuse to let this destroy him.

The people at the foster home had kept him away from his father for _two years_. He had clung to the hope that someday, he would be able to break into the prison and see him; and, if not, he would definitely have been able to see him by the time he was eighteen and no longer underage.

Now, even that distant hope had been torn away from him.

Barry could feel that hot hatred coursing through him again, spreading out in tendrils from the pit of his stomach to the end of every finger and toe, to the top of his scalp. It made his skin itch and filled him with unbridled energy.

He hated the foster home, and Ms. Amelia. He hated the guard who had stopped him. He hated the officers who had come to visit him. He hated Mrs. Medea and every teacher in the building.

Most of all, he _hated hated hated_ Joe West.

He made a decision in that moment; he wouldn't give anyone the satisfaction of seeing him weak and vulnerable. Not now, and not ever again.

Barry quickly brought another handful of cold water up to his face and washed the sticky sweat and tears into the sink. He ducked back into the bathroom stall, rolled a line of toilet paper out and wadded it into a large, soft bundle. He used it to pat his face dry and blow his nose before tossing it in the garbage.

He turned back around to the mirror, taking in his still-bloodshot eyes and red nose. There was nothing he could do about that. But it was an improvement.

He glanced up at the clock on the wall above him. There was still fifteen minutes left in lunch.

He could either go, and pretend nothing had happened, or he could hide in the dorm for the rest of the day.

Barry scowled. He wasn't a coward.

* * *

After putting his plastic lunch tray onto a cafeteria table and dropping onto a hard bench, Barry found himself without much of an appetite. He pushed his pile of chicken and potatoes around on his plate absently, staring at his reflection in the metal fork and knife.

The anger was still running through him, making him restless and hot, but he couldn't address it right now.

Right now, he needed to act normally.

Barry forced a piece of tough chicken into his mouth, still frowning and deep in thought. He continued to gaze at the blurry shapes in his cutlery.

Three forms appeared in the gray space behind his reflection.

He turned around, already fearing the worst.

Of course, it was Tony, Mark, and Roy. Who else would it be. Barry glanced away, but they had already seen his red-rimmed eyes.

"What's the matter, _Lightning Boy_? You been crying? Boo-hooing over your mommy again?"

Barry rolled his eyes, Tony's remarks glancing off him. He had heard much worse in his first few months there. In fact, he had probably heard ten variations of that same insult from Tony's gang alone.

He turned back around in his seat, poking at his food again. Then Mark, who was normally the quietest of the group, said something to Tony behind him that made him freeze.

"Ya know what I heard? I heard that someone saw him blubbering in the boy's room about his dad. Bet that's what it is."

Heat coursed through Barry, turning his face pink and making his blood boil. He couldn't believe someone had seen him like _that_. His head pounded as he stared in shock at his plate.

By now, several of the other tables around him had fallen silent, listening to their conversation.

Tony snickered. "That true, Allen?"

Barry didn't respond, still frozen with his back to Tony and with his fork and knife in his hands. He was surprised they hadn't clattered out of his grip by now.

A thick finger prodded his shoulder roughly. "You deaf? Or are you still crying?"

The heat was making pools of sweat gather in his palms. Small black dots gathered at the edges of his vision as his breath hitched.

 _Nonononononono._

"Wow. I mean, I can't say I'm surprised. Always knew you were still a crybaby, even if you pretended you were all big and tough. It's pathetic, really."

Barry was in actual, physical pain. His heart drummed agonizingly in his chest. The heated pressure and energy under his skin was almost unbearable. Yet he remained absolutely still.

"What's the big deal, anyway? I mean, your dad's a _murderer_. He _murdered_ your mom. Unless you're still crazy and think that a ghost did it?"

Barry slowly closed his eyes and swallowed as much as he could with his gritty, dry mouth. He was going to take ten deep breaths.

"Did he finally kick the bucket? Huh? Well, it's not _that_ big of a deal... you know he deserved it, right?"

A bomb exploded in Barry's chest, sending burning sparks through him and propelling him up, out of his seat.

Without even blinking or hesitating, Barry whipped around and stabbed Tony in the chest.

* * *

 **Ah, cliffhangers! I hope you all are not too terribly upset with me for killing off Henry. I got the inspiration from s2e7, when he told Barry about how his belief in him as a child was all that got him through prison.**

 **See you next chapter. The fallout will be pretty interesting... :)**


	4. Chapter 4

**Author's Note: Again, thank you all so, so much for your continued patience and support. I'm so sorry for the late update after that mean cliffhanger, but this was AP exam week, and things were just crazy, so again, I apologize to all of my readers! This is a shorter chapter, but a substantial one will come by the end of the weekend, I promise, and I will be answering all questions from my reviews there. :) Enjoy!**

* * *

Tony stood frozen, mouth open in shock, as Barry stood across from him, the knife still tightly clenched in his hand. His eyes seemed to bulge out of his head as he choked out a sputtering gasp, before spasming away from Barry and landing on the hard tile floor.

Barry watched him uncomprehendingly. The entire lunchroom had fallen absolutely silent, with every set of wide eyes on him, and on Tony.

No one moved.

Barry thought he could hear his own heart beating- but it was a relief. Before, it had been pounding as rapidly as a hummingbird's wings, each thump striking him like a hammer blow- now, he could tell it was starting to slow down.

That was ridiculous. He should be afraid now.

But he wasn't.

Roy was the first to cry out- not a piercing scream, but a choked wheeze as he fell back and away from Barry, trying to put as much distance between them as he could.

And that's when all hell broke loose.

The room erupted in a chorus of screams and panic, the entire crowd of children scrambling for the doors. It was like an enormous pot had been brought to a heated, chaotic boil.

It was startling for Barry to realize that they were running because of _him._

They were terrified of _him._

Barry stood in the center of the lunchroom as the crowd began to dissipate, still gripping the knife, staring down at Tony, who had stopped convulsing and now lay still with glassy eyes, a gaping wound in his chest.

Barry knew he was dead. He had aimed for his heart.

* * *

Ms. Amelia was sitting in her office when she heard the shrieks and screams begin to echo from the lunchroom. She paid it no mind- if there was a fight, there were teachers on standby throughout the cafeteria.

But the cries coming from the lunchroom weren't eager and excited, the sounds of a fight being cheered on. They were panicked screeches and the sound of an entire cafeteria of unruly children stampeding the hallways.

She stood up quickly, closing her computer and walked to the door of her office, staring out the rectangular window in astonishment. There were at least two hundred kids spilling out of the doors of the cafeteria, which she could see at the end of the hallway from her door.

As the crowd of children began to thin, she could see a lone boy standing in the middle of the cafeteria, staring down at the floor.

 _Oh, God, what had he done this time?_

Ms. Amelia swung out her door, no longer afraid of hitting the massive herd of children- they were all down the hallway, with the exception of a few stragglers struggling to keep up with the group .

She walked briskly down the tiled hall, her short heels _click click clicking_ against the floors. They were the only source of noise in the deserted corridor.

The heels screeched in protest when she came to a sudden halt at the door of the cafeteria.

Ms. Amelia's hand slowly rose to her mouth, her eyes like moons as she stared at the scene.

Barry Allen was standing over a dead body, a knife in his hand still coated in crimson.

Nothing could have prepared her for this. There had been fights at the school. There had been broken noses and arms, bleeding cuts, knobby bruises, any injury imaginable. Some of the children were disturbed, after all.

But _Barry Allen_ , not even _fourteen years old_ , was standing over a dead body. A student she didn't recognize was on the floor.

He looked up at her, just noticing her standing in the doorway, and, realizing he was still clutching the weapon, quietly placed it on the table where he had been sitting.

What disturbed her the most was the calm, placid look on Barry's face. He didn't look horrified, or beg for forgiveness. He didn't look insane or unreasonable.

He looked, Ms. Amelia thought with a shudder, like an naive, angelic child.

That didn't stop her from fumbling in her pocket to reach her phone. She held it up to her ear with trembling hands, her eyes never leaving Barry.

"9-1-1, what's your emergency?"

* * *

Barry had a lot of time to think that night. They put him in solitary confinement ("For now"), as a mentally disturbed delinquent.

How they determined that, he didn't know. They asked him questions- about how he felt. Why he did it. If he had ever thought of doing this before.

He felt fine. His anger was gone, as if the knife had somehow been a bridge for him to release the hot, liquid anger into Tony, anger that had overflowed and spilled forth in dark red drops. The pressure behind his eyes and in his chest was gone.

Why did he do it? Because Tony deserved to die. Barry weighed the crime and his given punishment even some time later, and yes, it was true. The pain Tony had caused Barry was equivalent to his fate. He had no doubt about that.

Had he ever thought of doing this before?

 _I'm thinking of doing it right now._

The interviewing officers were not the same first two who had come to him after his mother's murder. They were not nearly as kind. But they looked uneasy after his responses.

They wrote on their clipboards for what seemed like hours.

Then he was taken to a small, windowless room. No movie-style cages and locks. It wasn't what he had imagined it would be.

What had he imagined it would be?

He had imagined breaking out. Freeing his father. Running away. But to where?

He didn't belong anywhere anymore. He hadn't belonged at the foster home, and he certainly didn't belong here, with only the shrinks to talk to.

He allowed himself to feel a wave of self-pity. He didn't deserve this. He deserved to be free to do what he wanted. To be able to do what every other child could.

"You'll only be here for a while" turned out to be a stretch. Barry wasn't sure how much time had passed. There was a clock on the wall, but no calendar. He was allowed paper, but no pencils. No pens. Only a chair bolted to the floor, a bed in the corner, a restroom to the side.

He spent most of his time asleep. It was better than reality. But while he slept, he saw only gold and red light, crackling like a roll of thunder, webbing across his eyelids to form the face of a man in a yellow costume.

Sometimes he lost track of what was a dream and what was reality. Iris called him. His father broke out and found him. The foster home decided to take him back. He had a life sentence. Joe was there one day, but he probably imagined that. Joe would never come.

But the worst dream came in the form of his mother walking through the door, a wide smile on her too-pale face and her red hair falling down to her chest, where a shard of glass protruded.

Barry could feel himself getting older. There were no mirrors. But he figured he was several years older than he had been. The life before his confinement seemed distant and foggy, lost in the spiral of dreams and nightmares and dark thoughts.

To keep him focused, Barry formed escape plans, each one more outlandish that the previous. He couldn't comprehend the thought of staying the for the rest of his life.

He vowed to himself that he wouldn't.

He was going to get out.

* * *

 **Powers will be coming next chapter, so stay tuned! Please r &r if you enjoyed. A huge thanks to all of my readers, again!**


	5. Chapter 5

**Author's Note: WOW. I honestly cannot thank you all enough for the love and attention this story has been getting. We broke 2,000 views yesterday, and it's just so overwhelming to realize that your writing has traveled to so many people. I am just floored by how amazing you all are.**

 **A huge thanks to all those who reviewed and asked questions.**

 **MarvelMatt: Thank you so much! We will definitely see a mix of those three brought out. Barry will be conflicted, let me put it this way. :)**

 **Deddo: Thank you! And yes, but it really depends on how you look at it.**

 **Guest: Iris will actually have a POV scene next chapter, so be on the lookout for that. :)**

 **MichaelTheBeast: Barry will become a villain, but I guess it will really depend on whose side you're on. And lightning will probably stay the same, unless something big happens to change it.**

 **A huge, huge, enormous thanks to everyone else who reviewed. I cannot thank you all individually unfortunately, because I'm sure people want to get to the story, but I read every one of your reviews and they just bring me so much happiness.**

 **Without further ado, here's chapter 5. Enjoy!**

* * *

The air was brisk and dark when Barry finally exited Iron Heights.

It had been surprisingly easy. He had spent weeks pushing and prodding one of the shrinks to leave a door cracked open (he was very convincing, and the man was more fragile than he appeared). He had been surprised to find how easily he could read the psychologist's emotions, when he rarely felt such things himself. How easily he could confirm his fears and doubts with a few softly spoken words.

It was a simple matter to slip out of the open door without the cameras catching him. Their field of view was only so wide, and he knew where it was. Of course, he would be caught by one eventually, but for now, he was taking advantage of his knowledge about the prison's outdated security equipment and buying himself some time. Then he ran into his first guard.

It was not a good day for that officer.

Barry smashed the guard's nose in with a sharp thrust of his elbow, who was taken by surprise, then kneed him hard in the stomach and left him to groan on the floor, his face wet with blood.

He was at a disadvantage being an untrained inmate who had been locked away from several years, but what he lacked in strength and experience he made up for in adrenaline, desperation, and cunning.

He stealthily navigated through the maze of halls. Two, three more guards down and he was in the entry, and he was on the door guard in a flash, knocking his head into the wall before the guard could even open his mouth to shout.

It amused Barry how incredibly ill-prepared and trained the night shifts were.

The cameras in the lobby caught him, of course. He didn't have time to prepare for those.

He barely noticed his aged, gaunt face in the shadowy reflection of the windowed door before he thrust it open and stepped outside.

The chilly night air was welcoming and soothing, with a soft breeze whispering through the grassy space in front of him. Tiny pellets of cold rain fell quietly, without sound. Barry couldn't help but stop for a second, feeling the wind trickling through his open fingers in currents. Everything was quiet and still.

Then a siren began to shriek, puncturing the calm. Lights blinked on in high towers all around the yard, and the velvety blackness was chased back by the harsh artificial brightness, back behind the fence.

 _The fence._

It was visible now, fifty yards in front of him. He could make it if he sprints. But suddenly the harsh whiteness was glaring at him in the face.

Barry grimaced, covering his face with his hands and trying to blink the colored spots obscuring his vision out of his eyes. He had been accustomed to the dim lighting of the prison for so long, the spotlight seemed impossibly bright.

A voice was shouting through a megaphone or a speaker, he couldn't tell which. Garbled yelling and commands.

He ignored them, still trying to see past the blinding brightness that obscured his vision. He couldn't see anything.

The rain was falling harder now, beating his head and shoulders with a strange ferocity. He was soaked to the bone, his hair and clothes clinging to him and making him shiver with cold.

All Barry could think was that he had failed. He had one shot. He had had one goddamn shot to escape and he had _blown_ it.

They would never let him out now. He would never, ever get his freedom back. He would always be considered _deranged._ A murderer.

The garbled shouting from the loudspeaker ceased abruptly, with a sharp burst of static. At the same time, the spotlight blinked out of existence, leaving Barry still blinded with spots of color.

He froze, thinking that surely, now they were coming for him. They had given up trying to reason with him and now they were going to grab him, drag him _back_ , lock him up, tie him down, never to see the sky again. The thought was inconceivably terrifying.

But several seconds passed and nothing happened. No figures emerged from the night to capture him again. As his vision slowly cleared, Barry realized that all of the lights around the prison perimeter had shut off.

He couldn't believe his luck. They were having a freaking _power outage_.

And a power outage meant that the fence wouldn't be charged.

He hadn't really had a plan for dealing with the fence before. But now, he was saved, by some unknown deity.

Barry bolted to the perimeter fence, faster than he had thought he was even capable of running, nearly slipping in the mud but making it there unharmed. He spit rainwater out of his mouth- the stuff was literally pouring from the sky, making it almost impossible to see again. He relied on his hands to guide him up the gate.

He was more careful and slower with the climbing after a few seconds; he was at least eight feet above the ground now, and a fall would not be pleasant.

He continued to climb, shoving each foot through a square hole and grasping blindly for the wire netting above him for handgrips. He hissed when he thrust his hand upwards, only to cut it on the razor-sharp wire loops at the top of the fence.

He had forgotten about those.

Swearing, he cradled his injured hand close to his chest, hanging loosely by his remaining hand and feet. The damage to his hand was probably not severe, but the wires had cut deep grooves in some areas, and the sensitive nerves in his hand sent shock waves to his brain.

How the hell was he supposed to get over those? Especially when he couldn't see?

He was considering maneuvering along the fence to see if he could find a clear area over the main gate when there was a deep, rumbling _BOOM_ of thunder that shook his very core.

Barry looked up at the sky a second before his vision went white.

There was a hissing, sparkling, crackling and then a feeling like a boulder had been dropped on his head. He flew backwards off the fence, hanging in the air for an indefinite amount of time before crashing into the packed earth with the force of a two-ton truck.

His heart felt sickly fast, beating an agonizing drum that reverberated around his head. Needles were being stabbed into every inch of his flesh. His ears rang like a chorus of wailing sirens.

He lay eagle-spread on the ground for hours, struggling to choke air in and out of his lungs. His eyes were frozen open, still wide in shock. None of his limbs seemed to work.

The rain continued to pummel him, getting in his eyes and nose, choking him, but there was nothing he could do.

He couldn't think.

In the early, dark hours of the morning, the rain finally slowed to a drizzle, then stopped. He was still made of iron and cement, eyes glued to the molten gray sky, and arms and feet bolted to the ground.

Then, just before the sun began to rise on the horizon, a sliver of light breaking its way through the trees beyond the fence, some feeling returned to his limbs. Slowly, he was able to shift his shoulders and legs, then twitch his fingers and toes.

It was a blessed feeling to finally be able to close his eyes. They were swollen and dry, and irritated to an extreme. He kept them shut as the rest of his body slowly regained feeling, one nerve at a time.

But there was something else. His body was functional again. But even after all of his nerves had woken up, energy continued to flood him. Not just energy. Power.

It came on slowly, not like the strike of lightning. His breathing became faster and shorter as his body swelled with the intoxicating wave of vitality.

The sensation made his head spin.

Barry's eyes blinked open again, and he gasped as a current of electricity buzzed to life within him.

He wanted to release it. He had to. There was no choice.

He wanted to _run._

* * *

The world was a three dimensional picture, frozen in place, and he was the sole controller of each and every event. Lightning crackled through his veins and thundered in his heart, and he was the master of the elements.

The supply of power in his blood and bones was infinite. He was made of pure _speed_ , enough speed to unravel the Earth's rotation and halt the flow of time. Everyone and everything was his.

He had spent so long in that cell. So long staring at the ceiling and dreaming dreaming dreaming, an endless barrage of visions occupying every slow moment. He had been trapped in a cage.

Now he was still trapped, but not in the same way. His body felt like lightning in a bottle- the phrase had never been so accurate- as if he was a fragile vessel holding the power of a hurricane inside of him.

But not when he was running. When he ran, the lightning bound to him, clung to his skeleton and infused his blood. He was a speed demon, unstoppable and invincible.

He learned to reign the storm in when he needed to. He learned its ways and he knew how to slow down.

But why would he _ever want to_?

Why would he even _attempt_ to keep the lightning on a leash when he could shatter the very ground with his feet? When he left a trail of fire and smoke behind him, everywhere he went?

Barry ran for three days straight. Through Central City, to the rest of the continent, over entire _oceans_ in mere seconds until he reached the ends of the earth and was certain he had seen everything. And then he did it again.

It was incredibly painful to slow down after that. He tried halfheartedly once or twice before realizing, after three days, he hadn't eaten, drunk, or slept. He had to stop.

It was almost worse than being struck by the lightning.

Three days' worth of muscle pain and lack of oxygen caught up with him in mere seconds. He wasn't outrunning them anymore, and the sensation was excruciating. He couldn't breathe, couldn't see straight, couldn't feel anything except the hot fire licking his brain and muscles.

He lay in a tight ball in the corner of an abandoned storefront for almost an hour, trying to stay out of sight and heal as quickly as he could.

Barry was shocked to realize that his deeply sliced hand was completely, flawlessly healed. He only noticed after staring at it while he was still recovering, and then remembering his incident with the wire fence.

He pondered what it meant for a while. Did he have _superhealing_ as well? Was this also a result of the lightning? And how the hell did that even work? Not to mention his new speed-

There were voices, coming from the outside of the storefront.

He froze, not even breathing. The voices sounded gruff and predominantly male, but he couldn't tell for sure. It was the middle of the night. No one should be out-

There was a deafening noise as the glass window in the front of the store shattered. Barry's eyes went wide. He had somehow been able to vibrate _through_ the glass, but these people weren't being discreet. Were they going to camp out here? They probably thought it was abandoned, there was nowhere for anyone to come in.

Maybe they were checking for any remaining goods or money. They were probably harmless. If he was quiet, they wouldn't notice him.

Footsteps. Feet crunched the shards of glass and spread deeper into the store.

He was in a corner, behind an aisle and a row of empty refrigerated glass boxes for beverages. They wouldn't come back behind there. The cash register was up front-

"Hey, you!"

Every sore muscle in Barry's body tensed painfully.

The voice was rough and less than three feet away. It was unmistakably meant for him.

"Who are you? Get up! Hands in the air!"

Cops? _No_ , he thought. Cops wouldn't bust in a glass window in the middle of the night. Why would they be here?

There was a click of a gun being cocked.

 _Nonononono._

But what did he have to be afraid of? He could dodge the bullets, run far away. But what if he couldn't harness the lightning again? It was still there, flickering weakly within him, but what if he couldn't figure out how to use it again, now that he had stopped?

Barry pushed himself up unsteadily, off the ground, towards the man.

* * *

Thomas's eyes widened as the figure cloaked in shadow on the floor stood up, now illuminated by the flashlight of someone behind him.

The painfully skinny man- or kid, he couldn't tell which- was clothed in nothing but tattered, soot-streaked clothes so burnt he couldn't tell what they originally looked like. His eyes were hung with dark bags. His shoes were nonexistent.

But the strangest thing about the man was the fact that he was _vibrating_. Not constantly. Some limbs vibrated more than others, and the shaking faded in and out at times. But it wasn't really shaking or trembling. The man was literally _vibrating_ , making him almost translucent.

Thomas took a step back, his resolve wavering but his gun firmly pointed at the subject in front of him. It was, without a doubt, a metahuman. An unlucky freak of nature resulting from the particle accelerator explosion.

He glanced back at his fellow officers. The witness who had called them about a blur entering a storefront in Western Central was apparently telling the truth. They had apparently come to the same conclusion. Four guns were aimed at the man's head.

Thomas decided he would be the first to speak again.

"Who are you? Are you a metahuman? Answer me _now,_ or we shoot."

The man's brow furrowed in confusion, staring at his police uniform, then back up at his face. He opened his mouth to speak.

But no words came out.

The man's mouth moved more rapidly than Thomas would have thought possible. But when he had stopped less than a second later, no sound had been emitted.

* * *

Barry stared down the officer, repeating himself again. "My name is Barry Allen. I don't know what a meta-human is. And what are _you_ doing here? Police shouldn't be here, breaking into a storefront in the middle of the freaking night."

The officer did not answer. He remained in place, staring in confusion at Barry.

 _Oh._

The lightning must be back. He realized that the world was again a still photo, and that the officers took twenty seconds to blink. It had been difficult to tell, with the store being dark and the officers being hidden in shadow. It worried him, that it was back again without his calling upon it. But for now, he was grateful.

They were police. He counted five officers in total, four holding guns pointed at his head and one with a flashlight pointed at his chest.

He walked to each officer and carefully disarmed them. But when he got to the last officer, standing further behind the flashlight-man, he froze, his hand halfway to the man's gun.

A mixture of emotions rose in his chest. Shock. Disbelief. Confusion.

 _Anger._

The officer was older now, more stooped, with a touch of gray in his close-cropped hair. But it was unmistakably Detective West.

White rage lit up his vision, and the lightning responded. It poured forth like a river, the power almost lifting him off his feet. It was so much, he could see it crackling around him, spilling like water from an overfilled bucket, even though he was stationary, staring at West.

Barry willed time to go back to normal again, as difficult as it was with the excess electricity snapping around him.

The officers all spun around in shock, hands empty of any weapons and realizing that their target had vanished to the other side of the room.

Detective West looked fairly calm, but Barry could see beneath that exterior. He was trapped at the hands of an unknown, supernatural force and was terrified.

" _Do you know me?_ " Barry whispered quietly.

Detective West swallowed, and he tried to scan Barry's face. No recognition lit up in his eyes, despite their close proximity.

He shook his head fearfully.

The lightning snapped brutally around his frame, charging the air in the storefront. The hair on the officer's arms stood on end. Barry was struggling to contain it now, struggling to maintain the speed urging him to release it.

Of course he didn't recognize Barry. He had imprisoned his father, sent him away to an orphanage, but that didn't matter to him. His father was _dead_ because of this man and Tony had been _murdered_ because of this man and Barry was called a _monster_ because of this man.

And never a word from him. Never a visit. An apology.

He hadn't seen Barry since he was eleven years old.

Despite the electricity nearly shocking him with every arch it made on Barry's body, Detective West again regained his composure.

"Sir, I'm going to have to ask you to step away. I think you're dealing with something right now that you can't control, and it's not your fault. But you should contain yourself now and not do something you'll regret later."

Lightning flashed in Barry's eyes, and Detective West took a startled step back.

"No." His voice was reverberated strangely, echoing as if several people were talking at the same time. He was vibrating to the point of near invisibility, straining to contain the overflowing electricity within him.

"It's not my fault."

There was an audible _SNAP_ as the world slowed down again and the lightning was released, propelling him faster than ever as he ran to each of the other four officers, thrusting a vibrating hand through each of their chests.

Time returned back to normal as he returned to his original position in front of Detective West, who hadn't noticed anything.

Then each of the officers around them collapsed to the ground.

Detective West's breath halted as his eyes bulged and his mouth fell in horror, seeing the enormous gaping holes in each of the officers' chests and backs.

Barry felt a weight rise off his chest, allowing him to breathe, even as he watched it fall on West's. The satisfaction he got from the officer's terror was immense. His heart rate slowed as every tense muscle, charged with electricity, relaxed slightly.

This was _justice._

Barry let out a low chuckle as Detective West fell to his knees. He felt practically _giddy_ , drunk on speed and enjoying the pain he was inflicting on his old enemy.

He had spent so long in a _cage_. Restrained by others who didn't understand him or even bother to understand. Angry administrators and cruel children, underpaid shrinks and lazy prison guards. But now he was free.

More than that, he was practically a _god_. He could restrain and bend time to his will. Nothing escaped him. And he could inflict punishment as he saw fit.

There were so many things he could do with the man. So many horrible things.

Detective West realized it, too. His eyes shone with tears as he looked back up at Barry, opening his mouth to speak- maybe to ask who he was, or to tell him that he had a daughter, or maybe even to beg for his life.

But as much as Barry would enjoy that, he would enjoy this even more.

Detective West flinched in shock as the vibrating man disappeared suddenly, in a flash of bright yellow lightning. He stared at his comrades, tears now falling freely as he took in the magnitude of what had just happened.

* * *

Captain Singh was in the middle of yelling at his CSI when Joe arrived from the elevator.

His eyes were blank and swollen, and his clothes were stained with soot. Almost the entire department turned around to look at the always composed detective.

He looked anything _but_ composed now.

Singh left the CSI hanging mid-sentence and walked quickly over to Detective West. Joe barely noticed him as he leaned on a nearby table for support.

"Detective. _Detective._ What happened? Where are the rest of the metahuman taskforce members?"

The man didn't answer.

" _Joe_." Singh said softly. "What happened?"

Detective West took a shuddering breath. "There- there was a- a _demon_ there, Singh."

The captain's brow furrowed. "Joe, what do you mean? A demon? Was the suspected metahuman at the site?"

Joe nodded. "He was there, and then- and then he just wasn't. He- he was vibrating, and then he _bolted_ around the room."

Singh stared in confusion. "He was- a teleporter? Like Baes?"

Joe shook his head vigorously. "No. He- I don't know how to explain- he was like a bolt of _lightning_. And- and then-"

Detective West looked up at Singh, fresh tears glazing his eyes. "He killed them all, Singh. In a- in a _flash_."

 **Please leave a review if you enjoyed!**


	6. Chapter 6

**Author's Note: Again, I cannot thank you all enough for your continued support for this story. It's just so, so amazing to see people actually reading and keeping up with this story, and I really do apologize for the sporadic updates. Exams are over now, and I should be posting more chapters more regularly. Thank you to everyone who reviewed!**

 **Guest: Yes, Dark Barry is a savage. I completely agree, and your comment made me laugh!**

 **ROSEY cheeks: Thank you so much! Still not 100% sure which ship(s) I will do, but WestAllen might be one of them, and that's a really awesome idea.**

 **Guest: Probably will not be a SnowBarry ship, at least anytime soon. Sorry. :(**

 **Crimson Comet: Wow! Thank you so much! And I'm afraid you may have to wonder about Joe for a few more chapters... heheh.**

 **Also, I don't know if any of you all have been keeping up with Death By Verbicide's "The Uncontrollable and The Impossible", but it is an amazing fic. Pretty long, ha, but definitely worth a read if you want to check it out.**

 **Once again, thank you all for reviewing. I will have a longer chapter up by the end of the weekend. Hope you enjoy!**

* * *

Iris frowned as she scrolled through the news on her blog. Robberies, murders, assaults, revisits to older cases- but there was one new topic everyone couldn't stop talking about.

Sure enough, a new sighting of the speedster- the Flash, as he had been coined- was at the top of the page. No murders or other incidents. This time, at least.

The sighting had been at Jitters. She shuddered to think that he had been that close.

It had been a week since her dad had arrived home in the early morning darkness, his eyes red and his face defeated. She remembered. She had been sitting on the couch, eating popcorn and watching TV, patiently waiting for him to come home so she could playfully scold him for being late.

That was what should have happened.

Instead, four officers had been brutally murdered and her father was a witness.

The criminal who had done it remained unapprehended. He was another rogue metahuman, a man who could move faster than the human eye. This man- the Flash- was unidentified, male, and incredibly dangerous, if the brief reports were anything to go by. No one had had an up-close view of him, except for her father, and he had been too shocked by the incident to remember exactly what the man looked like.

Iris skimmed the comments on her blog. Apparently, there was speculation that the criminal could be a prison-escapee; over thirty inmates had escaped the night of the particle accelerator explosion.

The particle accelerator explosion.

Iris had been driving in her car, on the way home from a shift at Jitters, when she had caught a glimpse of the enormous, electrifying explosion in her rearview mirror. Not the full thing- just a flash of yellow light and an enormous dome of energy spreading across the sky.

Joe had not been at the CCPD that night. He had been with his partner investigating an abandoned farmhouse. The criminal they had been after had shot and killed his partner, Detective Chyre, and had attempted to take off in a plane when the dome of energy took it down.

Metahumans- people whose genes were impacted by the explosion for unknown reasons- were slowly appearing in public for the first time. It was her father's job, as part of the metahuman taskforce, to help with containing criminals who had been given "gifts". A man who could control the weather. A woman who could teleport.

And now, a man faster than a bolt of lightning.

As horrible as it was- as much as Iris hated to admit it- the very concept of metahumans fascinated her. Especially a man with superspeed.

How did his cells not just burn up? Would he age faster, or need to eat faster? What about shoes? Wouldn't they just catch on fire? Why lightning? There were so many unanswered questions.

But she would never get them answered. The bottom line was, the Flash was a powerful murderer who knew her father and had killed four officers in less than half a second. He terrified her. And he was free to run rampant through Central City.

Iris blew out a long breath, closing her laptop and zipping it in her bag.

Someone needed to stop him.

* * *

Joe knocked on Captain Singh's office door, a stack of reports in one hand and a mug of coffee in the other. He had been at the precinct for almost thirteen hours straight, reading through reports and gathering information for the proposal he was about to make.

To his surprise, the door opened almost immediately- but the man at the door wasn't Singh. Joe narrowed his eyes at the blonde officer who took a startled step back after nearly running into him.

Of course, Detective Thawne's face instantly relaxed into a cheesy grin. He nodded at Joe on his way out the door.

Thawne had been dating Iris for almost two years, much to Joe's annoyance. He was an energetic new recruit who had not only a lack of common sense, but also a police badge and an assistant partner.

Joe couldn't stand him.

Singh gave him a smile as he stepped into the office and sank into a chair.

"Good morning, Detective West..?"

Joe grunted in response. He tossed the stack of reports onto the heavy wooden desk. Singh blinked in surprise.

"This is everything we have on the man with superspeed. Reports, traces, descriptions of evidence, sightings, pictures."

Singh's eyes lit with understanding. He sighed. "Detective. I understand the personal vendetta you must have against this man. I know what he did was unforgivable. And believe me, I want him apprehended just as much as you do."

Joe huffed, but said nothing.

"But ask yourself," Singh continued, "What can we do right now to catch him? We've tried everything we've got. He travels at Mach 2, West. Mach 2. And I absolutely do not want the lives of any more officers risked in pursuit of him."

"He hasn't committed any more crimes. We have bigger metahumans to work on- ones that are immediate threats. We can't take on every freak in the city at once. We've already lost so many from that damn particle accelerator..." Singh shook his head. "No. We'll work on the Flash later."

Joe clenched his fists. His grip on the mug tightened painfully.

"With all due respect, Captain, this man _is_ an immediate threat. I think we're being blind. He could come in here right now and kill any number of us, and we wouldn't have time to lift a finger. We need to be prepared. He's possibly the most dangerous meta of them all. And I've seen firsthand what he can do."

Singh shook his head. "I know. I know how hard this must be for you. But the truth is, we just can't, West. We're stretched too thin as it is, and we can't take him down with just a few officers. We simply don't have the technology."

Joe took a deep breath. "STAR labs does."

Singh's expression darkened. "You really want to ask STAR for help right now? After what they've just done? I don't think there's anyone even working there right now. And thank goodness for that, because if there was, I'd wring their necks. No, I take that back. I'd wring Wells' neck, wheelchair or not."

"I know." Joe said quietly. "But honestly, I think it's worth a shot. They created this monster- they might be able to take him down."

Singh stared at him, deep in thought.

"And we have nothing else to lose. If they fail, it's at their expense," Joe continued. "If they take him down, he's no longer a threat we have to worry about. If they don't, we're right back where we started."

Singh leaned back in his chair. "I still hate the idea of working with them. They have no idea what they're doing."

Joe shrugged. "It's your call, Captain. But I think that this is worth a try."

Singh hesitated, then nodded. "Go. You can try to convince them to do it. But don't be surprised if no one's there."

Joe gave him a grim smile. "Thank you. I'm going to help take down this man, I promise."

Singh nodded as Joe opened the door to leave. "I don't doubt it."

* * *

 **Again, this chapter was a little short, but a big chapter is coming by the end of the weekend. Please leave a review if you enjoyed! :)**


	7. Chapter 7

**Author's Note: Again, a huge thanks to all who reviewed. :) I know last chapter was a little slow, but it was just kind of a filler after all of that action. Here is the much longer chapter 7, as promised. Enjoy!**

* * *

Barry had never felt so _hungry_.

As he bolted through the streets, weaving through traffic and around frozen pedestrians, he couldn't remember a time when his stomach felt more empty, or when he felt more light-headed. He had raided several grocery stores, restaurants, even houses, by running through the walls and vanishing without a trace.

It did nothing to help.

After he had left Detective West, Barry hadn't stopped running except for extremely short intervals. He hadn't stopped vibrating, and he found that he couldn't, for the most part, control when the world froze around him; or, worse, when it resumed its normal pace.

He felt like he was on an extreme caffeine high, with huge crashes that came quickly, without him noticing them. He would be running for three, four hours, and then suddenly he would feel the effects of dehydration, lack of oxygen, and lack of food. It hurt worse with every crash.

His shoes and clothes were another matter. His pants and shirt were soot-streaked and smoldering; his shoes had dissolved quickly, leaving him mostly bare-footed. His disheveled brown hair was a constant fire hazard.

Pain ripped through Barry's abdomen again, stopping him in his tracks. He hit his knees, gasping for air. He looked up quickly, afraid the world had turned back to normal and people had noticed him, but no, the world was still.

That explained why he couldn't catch his breath. He was still in speed-time; while he thought that he was taking a break, his brief respite would be faster than anyone around him could blink.

Barry felt anger and frustration rising within him. This had gone too far. He couldn't reign in the lightning to save his life. It controlled him, not the other way around. And there was no way for him to do _anything_. He could speed-eat all he wanted, it just wasn't enough fuel to sustain the massive amounts of energy his body used.

How long would it be before he passed out from hunger while running and the police found his body, locked him away or killed him before he woke up? What if his speed left him just before he vibrated through a wall, and he slammed into a building at nine hundred miles an hour? Even his rapid healing wouldn't be able to handle that.

What he had taken to be a gift was really a curse. As much joy as running gave him, he needed to be able to control it. He needed to able to _stop shaking_ at unbelievable speeds and pull himself together long enough to communicate with other beings.

He needed someone to help him. He looked down on other humans now- how could he not, when they were constantly frozen helplessly around him?- but he couldn't do this alone. That he was sure of.

Who would have the knowledge and scientific capabilities to help him? Who would have the resources and insight into his particular problem?

Barry knew exactly who he would get to do it for him.

Though it caused his muscles to contract in pain, he forced himself to run, slowly and carefully, to STAR labs.

* * *

Caitlin stirred her coffee with a wooden straw, watching the creamer and steaming brown liquid collide and mesh together, the streaks of white transforming into caramel.

It had been exactly ten days since the particle accelerator exploded.

Not that she was counting, of course. The days seemed to smear together now, into one disorienting blur of heartache and confusion.

She mostly tried to just numb herself to the effects of the explosion now. But all the same she felt a twinge of sharp, fresh pain in her gut when she saw Dr. Wells' wheelchair, when she saw the reports of countless injuries and deaths on the news, when the silence of the lab seemed unbearable.

Cisco helped. He was always in the cortex, always trying to alleviate the damage and fix what had been wrong. He cracked jokes. He made puns. And he _was_ a great engineer.

But it wasn't enough.

Caitlin could never bring herself to give him more than a halfhearted smile every few days, to let him know that she appreciated him but couldn't show it right now.

Dr. Wells was a godsend. Caitlin couldn't believe it when he had immediately arrived back at the lab just two mornings after he had first been stuck in a wheelchair. However, he attacked the pile of new problems with a renewed ferocity. She figured he was doing exactly what she was to cope; throwing himself into the work.

And what a mountain of work it was.

Caitlin jolted backwards sharply when she took a swig of the still-steaming coffee, Cisco yelping in surprise as the quiet of the cortex was broken. Liquid sloshed over the sides of the mug as she quickly set it back on the desk, fanning her burned mouth.

Cisco put a splayed hand over his heart and sighed in relief. "Caitlin, I know you're obsessed with coffee, but try not to give me a heart attack next time you get some?"

She nodded, trying to soothe her burning tongue. "Sorry."

Cisco snorted, but flashed her a toothy grin and turned back to his monitor.

They worked in comfortable silence together for nearly twenty minutes, Caitlin organizing data from sensors in the lab, Cisco reading through information on the damaged infrastructure of the city. It was dull work, but it kept them busy, and it was necessary if they wanted to be able to help.

She looked up from her screen at the sound of Dr. Wells' wheelchair rolling down the curved hallway.

The gentle whirring of motors grew closer until Dr. Wells was in the cortex, looking tired but calm. He rolled around to Caitlin's desk.

"Anything new?"

She shrugged nonchalantly. "The particle accelerator floor dropped another ten degrees, almost down to normal operating temperature. We found more roofing damage, on the northwestern side of the building... it didn't interrupt any more wiring, though."

He nodded. "That's fine. Alert the repair crew as soon as they're done with the floors on the ground level."

Dr. Wells rolled to Cisco's side. "And any new information on the city?"

Cisco nodded. "Always is. A building in western downtown is showing signs of severe foundation stress, and it's worrying a lot of officials. They've evacuated the area."

Dr. Wells sighed. "That's not good. There's not much we can do about that, however, if it's already showing stress."

"I know. It just seems like so much damage."

Dr. Wells shook his head. "It is. But all we can do right now is help where we can, and hopefully assist further in the future. Is there anything else, Cisco?"

Cisco scrolled up his monitor. "Nothing else truly major. A few damaged stores went out of business... a meta was apprehended on 5th and Main for a robbery..."

He chuckled. "And the _Flash_ had another sighting, just a few minutes ago."

Dr. Wells, who had been rolling through the cortex to the other side of the room, came to a sudden stop.

"The _what_?"

Cisco shrugged. "It's what a few people on this blog have been calling him. It's a meta with what the police think might be superspeed... which, you know, would be awesome. But it's a stupid name. Sounds like the name of a guy who hides in an alley in a trenchcoat-"

"A metahuman with superspeed?" Dr. Wells wheeled back up to his desk. " Are you sure that's what you saw?"

Cisco nodded. "Bad guy. He killed a few officers about a week back. But he hasn't been found not running since then, so the police haven't focused on him too much, as best as I can tell."

Dr. Wells stared incredulously. "Excuse me-did you say- that this metahuman _killed_ several officers?"

"Yeah. It happened just a few days after the explosion, so it's no surprise it didn't make any major headlines. I only found it after a _lot_ of scrolling in the CCPN. But there's an entire blog now focused on new metas, and that seems to be the only thing anyone on there's posting about. He's had six sightings today already. "

Dr. Wells removed his glasses, twirling them between his index and thumb. "And- you didn't think this was worth mentioning."

Cisco rubbed his arm nervously. "I mean- I was only really trying to look at infrastructure, and there have been dozens of metas, so I wasn't really-"

"Enough." Dr. Wells waved him off and rolled up to the unoccupied monitor at the curved desk.

He hadn't tracked down Barry Allen in months. He had been in prison for ten years, there was no reason to. He was certain Allen would no longer be able to be the Flash, he was simply too damaged, and besides, the Flash wasn't supposed to appear until nine months later-

Within seconds, he had found the snippet of story stuck into the CCPN.

" _May third, four officers on CCPD task force murdered by unknown 'metahuman' at abandoned storefront in rural Central City."_

His pulse began to rise. Surely, this wasn't him. This was a teleporter, or some other, lesser metahuman.

Wells soon found the link to the full-length article on the police department's database. With a rising sense of dread, he clicked on the source.

He felt the blood drain out of his face as a large image of the crime scene popped up on the screen. Four officers slumped on the ground, large wounds on both their backs and chests. All still with guns in their hands.

 _No._

A hand slowly rose to his mouth as he read as quickly as he could through the article.

 _Male - identity unknown - metahuman taskforce - Joe West - superspeed._

Superspeed.

The Flash.

Barry Allen- a psychotic, cold-hearted killer with no morals-his creation- had gotten _superspeed._

"Damn it." He rolled backwards from the desk, quickly rotating and heading down the hall. " _Damn it."_

"Dr. Wells?" A deep voice called back from the cortex. Wells halted and reluctantly turned back, where Cisco and Caitlin were staring at him in confusion and a tall, African-American man stood behind them in the entrance to another hallway.

"Detective West, yes." He said impatiently, fiddling with the buttons on his chair, itching to head down the hall to Gideon. "And how, exactly, did you manage to enter my facility?"

West jerked his thumb over his shoulder. "I called, and you all didn't answer. The main entrance wasn't even guarded."

Dr. Wells huffed. "Well, we're a little short on staff, as you might have noticed. What did you need from us, again? I haven't received any calls from the Captain."

Joe crossed his arms. "That's because he doesn't want anything to do with you all. I don't really either, but I figured you're the best group to ask about these- these _meta_ -humans."

"I'm listening."

"I need someone with the technology and science to help the police catch the man with superspeed."

Dr. Wells smiled in wonder. How coincidental.

"This man- the _Flash_ \- is extremely dangerous, Wells. I've seen what he can do firsthand. He killed four officers faster than I could blink. It's insane. And he could take down all of Central City, if he wanted; there's nothing stopping him."

"You have to help us, after everything you've done. There's no excuse. We don't have the manpower right now, and you have a full working lab. You need to devote every ounce of capability you have right now into stopping this freak."

Dr. Wells rubbed his temple. "You blame us for the new metahuman."

Joe opened his mouth angrily to respond, but he cut him off before he could. "Of course, you do. Our particle accelerator caused his powers. But what do you expect us to do? We're three people and a cleanup crew working in an abandoned laboratory. You have the department."

"You have the technology," seethed Joe, "And you'd damn well be sure it's being used to _help_ the city this time, not wreck it. As you're obviously not doing anything important, you need to help us stop this criminal."

Much to Joe's surprise, Dr. Wells nodded. "I agree. We can help the police stop this speedster, with our developed technology."

"Speedster?" Joe intoned. "That's an interesting name."

Dr. Wells froze, then gave a half-hearted shrug. "It fits the description of this man, no? It's no different than coining the term _Flash_ or _metahuman_."

Joe nodded impatiently. "But how exactly do you plan on stopping him?"

Cisco spoke before Dr. Wells could respond. "Well, I'd need some more info on the meta, but speed is nothing more than heat, really. If we, say, created a device that could cool down this meta, his powers might not be effective."

Dr. Wells gave Cisco a pointed look. "I'll, uh, get right to building that, then." He glanced at Caitlin, then scurried out of the cortex.

Before Dr. Wells could respond, there was a strong gust of wind through the cortex. Papers flew off the desk, scattering throughout the room, and Caitlin and Cisco's hair blew back.

There was a man in the room.

Joe shrunk back instantly, eyes widening in fear. Caitlin and Cisco stood up, unsure of what to do about this metahuman with his back to them.

Wells took a second to look over the meta.

His clothes were charred, and the scent of burnt hair filled the room. He was incredibly thin and fairly tall, with a gaunt face and alarming green eyes.

He was absolutely a speedster. Yellow lightning flickered around his frame even as he stood in front of Wells, something he had not seen previously with the speedforce. Various limbs flickered in and out of sight, which troubled him.

"Barry Allen."

Detective West flinched. "What?"

Dr. Wells cleared his throat and spoke again. "Barry Allen. My name is Doctor Harrison Wells-"

The man began to vibrate faster. "I know- who you- are."

The speedster's voice was strangely echoed, as if a chorus of people were speaking at once.

"You- you're going to- help me." Each word seemed strained.

The lightning increased its intensity, nearly blinding Wells. Caitlin gasped as her coffee began to rise out of her mug.

"Dr. Wells-"

The man was suddenly less than two inches away from Harrison's face.

"What- what did you- do- me?"

His eyes were narrowed to slits. He repeated himself.

" _What-did you-do-to me?"_

Wells swallowed. Before he could reply, he was whisked out of the room.

* * *

 **Haha. I loooooove cliffhangers; don't you?**

 **Please leave a review if you enjoyed! :)**


	8. Chapter 8

**Author's Note: I know! I know, I'm a horrible, awful writer for making you all wait for so long after that cliffhanger. I have abused my author privileges. I apologize to everyone who was yelling at me in the comments to update... I know how it feels. If it makes you feel any better, your yelling inspired me to stay up way too late to finish and post. But the truth is, I am an extreme procrastinator, and I had a bad case of writer's block. Those two things do not mix well.**

 **Anyway. Here is the long-awaited Chapter 8! I sincerely promise that future updates will be more regular and frequent. Probably.**

 **Thank you to everyone who reviewed!**

 **ROSEY cheeks: Aw! I'm glad you enjoyed it. Sorry for that, uh, cliffhanger...**

 **Wildjay1585: Oh, he'll be regretting something, all right. Maybe not right now, but he will. :)**

 **Gill: THANK YOU SO MUCH FRIEND I APPRECIATE YOUR ENTHUSIASM**

 **Death by Verbicide: I do think I'm cute. And I like being mean. You have plenty of cliffhangers in your story, if I must remind you... ;)**

 **the darkest of them all: Absolutely! I'm completely fine with that. I look forward to reading your story! And there proooobably won't be any big romances soon, if that makes you feel better.**

 **Holly & Guest: I. Am. So. Sorry. ;-; I am so mean to you guys. But I updated! Finally!**

 **Hope you all enjoy!**

* * *

The trio- Joe, Cisco, and Caitlin- were left standing alone in the cortex, the burst of wind created by the speedster scattering papers and supplies through the room. They stared in shock at the empty wheelchair.

"He-he took Dr. Wells," Caitlin stammered. Cisco slowly peeled his eyes away from the chair to Caitlin. He shook his head in disbelief. "I've never- that shouldn't have been possible. He shouldn't have been-"

"Well, he did," Joe snapped, "And we need to find Wells." He pulled a black cell phone out of the pocket of his uniform and quickly dialed a number. The response was immediate.

Caitlin took a long breath and walked as quickly as she could without tripping over to her monitor, her heels clicking on the floor, sitting down and blinking the monitor on.

No more S.T.A.R. data surveillance today.

She tried to still the shaking in her hands as she searched for sightings and reports. She saw Cisco frantically checking some sort of satellite data to her right. Joe had already begun jogging to the elevator, phone to his ear.

The usual peace and silence the lab normally provided her with had disappeared. Dr. Wells was missing, in the hands of an extremely powerful, homicidal metahuman who was doing God knows what to him. There had been a rogue _in their very cortex._

It was one thing to read about dangerous metahuman criminals. It was another thing altogether to have them appear less than ten feet away.

She tightened her grip on her computer mouse, bringing her back to the present. She couldn't think about the implications of that now. Right now, she had to find Dr. Wells before he was hurt, or worse.

* * *

Joe didn't fully allow himself to exhale until the elevator doors closed.

He released a long, shuddering breath, closing his eyes and bringing a hand to his temple. This was something he couldn't have imagined in his worst nightmares.

Barry Allen was eleven the last time Joe had seen him. Small, skinny, with big green eyes and good intentions. He had even been Iris's childhood friend for several years.

The flickering, gaunt-faced monster he had seen was not, could not, be Barry.

When Nora was murdered, presumably by Henry, Barry was sent to a foster home. Joe had considered taking him in, but as much as he liked the kid, he didn't want a traumatized, possibly delusional child as a constant influence on Iris. Not to mention the awkward situation of bringing a new foster kid into the house.

That decision had haunted him, especially after Henry's suicide and the following incident at the foster home. Barry was labeled as psychologically unstable and kept in an isolated facility.

Joe had thought then, despite the guilt he felt, that he had made the right decision. Barry would have been a terrible influence, and it was best that he had been kept away from Iris. He still felt ashamed for never making any contact with Barry, but he was certain that it would have only added to his guilt.

What a mistake that had been.

Barry- who had unimaginable abilities- now seemed to have an extreme grudge against him. Who knows what he had been told in the foster home- Joe hadn't even considered that misinformation.

But it was too late now. Too late to make amends, except as a last-ditch resort. Barry Allen was a psychotic _speedster_ who couldn't be reasoned with.

As the elevator doors dinged and opened to the exit, Joe stopped.

What the hell was he going to tell Iris?

He quickly walked out of the elevator before the metal doors closed again. Nothing. Iris couldn't know.

* * *

Eobard anxiously watched the world fly by in streaks of light and color, forcing himself to stay perfectly still and to not bolt in the opposite direction. The speedster was holding him by his neck, nearly cutting off his air supply, and he could barely keep track of which direction he was going.

He didn't dare risk trying to access his speed. If it failed- he hadn't properly prepared with his tachyon, his suit was in the lab- he would have no chance, his secret would be out, and Barry Allen would most certainly kill him.

Barry Allen. He couldn't believe how stupid he had been. To think that he could shift the timeline, undo hundreds of years, without consequences; it was possibly one of the most blind things he could have done.

Who knew what would occur in this warped timeline? He had assumed that the Scarlet Speedster was incorruptible. Good. Pure. Heroic. A single death wouldn't change that.

How wrong he had been.

His eyes watered in the battering wind. This was certainly much faster than he had been expecting. This was speed that came with years of preparation and experience. It couldn't be used trivially, by a newborn speedster.

How had this Barry Allen managed to reach such high speeds without any mentor, any Velocity 9, any tachyon enhancement? Did he simply have a more powerful connection to the Speedforce? But why would the Speedforce choose a such an unstable human to become so powerful?

Good questions, but questions that couldn't be answered while he was being towed by his neck through Central City at several times the speed of sound.

Almost immediately after they left the lab, they arrived at what looked to be an abandoned storefront, the speedster phasing through a concrete wall easily.

Eobard groaned as he was dropped onto the slick tile floor, his legs still cramped from being confined to the wheelchair for so long. The numbness made it difficult to keep them still, but he'd had years of practice at doing so.

He propped himself up on his elbow, looking around the building. It looked almost like a corner convenience store; there was no way to be certain in the suffocating blackness that cloaked the walls. A streetlight flickered several hundred yards away from the broken window, but it was too faint to make anything out.

Then the speedster- who had been absent for several seconds after depositing him on the ground- zipped back into the building. The yellow lightning that crackled around him lit up the store with a blinding intensity. Eobard squinted into the brightness.

" _Harrison Wells."_ The voice was echoed strangely, each reverberation varying in pitch.

Eobard opened his mouth to speak- not that he had a clue what he could say- but before he could, the speedster had vanished and appeared in a separate corner. He flashed back to his original position, and then Eobard blinked and the speedster was mere inches away.

The scent of burnt hair and fabric choked him, and he coughed, his eyes watering nearly to the point of tears. The speedster blinked back to the center of the building. It was unnerving how quickly he moved from each spot.

"What do you-" He coughed again, trying to clear the smoke from his lungs. "What do you want from me?"

" _Harrison Wells."_ The lightning hissed and sparked.

" _Your particle accelerator did this."_

Eobard closed his eyes, desperately trying to think of a plan. None of his options were good. He could ask what was wrong- but that seemed too blunt, too likely to elicit an angry response. He could lead the speedster back to STAR- no good. He'd just be putting Cisco and Caitlin, his most valuable assets, in extreme danger. He could alert authorities- but how? He had no cell phone on him, no Gideon, no suit or comms.

Or, he could play along until he thought of a plan D.

"Well- yes- the accelerator may have altered your cells- as well as some others around the city."

" _I know about the metahumans. You created them too."_

Eobard wondered briefly exactly how much he knew about the metahumans. Had he met one? Recruited any?

He looked the man over. No, this speedster worked alone.

He zoomed closer again. " _But you did something different to me. Something wrong."_

 _Oh, he had. But not just by creating the particle accelerator._

Eobard slowly shook his head. "I- I'm sorry. What the particle accelerator explosion did to many people is unforgivable-"

" _You need to fix me."_ The speedster's chest rose and fell quickly, and he began to pace. Eobard swallowed, afraid of what an unhinged speedster would be capable of, but unsure how to deescalate the situation.

" _The lighting- I can't- I can't eat enough- I can't control it-it doesn't-"_ His words became too rapid for Eobard to understand, even with his limited Speed Force capabilities.

He watched anxiously as the speedster paced back and forth, speaking in an incomprehensible rush. The vibrations made him look almost transparent- as if he were seeing a ghost.

The description wasn't too far off.

Eobard went through his options again, hunting the storefront for clues or ideas. It was much more well lit, with the speedster lighting up the room like a flickering candle. He recognized the sign hanging outside of a shattered glass window to be the one labeling the site where the cops were massacred mere weeks before.

There was no possible way.

 _Why_ would the deranged speedster take his possible next victim to the very site where he had first been seen? There had to be a constant watch on the place, even if the detectives and analysts had exited the crime scene.

Whatever the case, there would be help on the way. The question was if it would get there in time.

The speedster stopped mid-speech and turned to him. He looked pale but still flickering and wired.

Of course. What had the man said? About not being able to eat enough?

Eobard had to suppress a sigh of relief. A normal speedster would consume upwards of ten thousand calories a day- but one like this? Constantly vibrating and running at extreme velocities? He would need to constantly consume high-calorie products. Speedster food.

Whatever the reason for his unstable connection to his speed, it was a blessing for him. The speedster wouldn't last much longer. Hopefully, he would go out before the authorities arrived.

He walked closer to Eobard- the first time he had seen him move at a normal pace. " _What is wrong with me?"_

The anger and aggression in his voice was unmistakable. Eobard pushed himself further backwards in fear, his back hitting a glass door behind him.

The speedster grabbed him anyway, shoving him down the aisle by his shoulder. " _How are you going to_ fix _me?"_

Eobard stammered, desperately trying to produce a response. "I don't- I don't know- if I had more research, maybe I could-"

" _More research? You want to do tests on me?"_ The speedster seethed. He grabbed the man by his throat and drew back his arm to attack again, only to notice Eobard's horrified expression and realise that his hands were vibrating. He slowly lowered his arm, slowing the vibrations.

The lightning crackling around him died down as well, dimming the amount of light in the store. When the speedster spoke, it was in a much slower, calmer voice.

" _You'll need a lab to work at?"_

Eobard nodded quickly, startled by how quickly the speedster's mood had shifted.

He could see the speedster thinking, weighing the options; much like he had been doing just minutes before.

Just as he seemed to reach a decision, there was a _clank!_ of metal striking metal, and suddenly there was an enormous metal anklet attached to the man's ankle, bolted into the ground a foot away. Eobard flinched and fell backwards in surprise. The speedster immediately tried to flash out of it, but to no avail. The length of cord was stretched tightly.

Eobard had been jolted by the sudden noise; now he heard people shouting in the perimeter around the store, on almost every side. _Reinforcements._

It was about time they came. Every sense alert, he watched the helpless speedster struggle with the cuff. Each time, without fail, the man was snapped back to his original position.

Eyes practically red with fury, he turned his gaze to Eobard, every limb vibrating and sparking again.

With an enraged howl, he thrust out a nearly invisible hand, curled into a claw, at the man lying just inches away.

Eobard didn't have time to think, or weigh his options, or calculate the consequences of his actions. He only had time to _move._

In a short burst of red electricity, he had moved several feet away from the chained speedster.

The officers just beginning to stream into the building hadn't noticed his movements. The security cameras, if there indeed were any, wouldn't have been fast enough to capture him. He was sure of that.

But the unhinged green eyes staring in horror had seen. This timeline's Barry Allen had seen him use his powers, and there was nothing he could do to undo that.

His secret was out.

* * *

 **Wow... I really love cliffhangers, huh? Sorry. But, I mean, at least I didn't end it five lines sooner (which I considered doing but then I felt bad). You're all welcome for that. :)**

 **Please leave a review if you enjoyed!**


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